Right Hand Man
by bigger infinities
Summary: Dean finds himself in a spot of trouble, but it looks like our favorite angel has his back. But why is that?


**Dean finds himself in a spot of trouble, but it looks like our favorite angel has his back. But why is that?**

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He exploded through the window with a force he hadn't expected, coming from such a small child. One look at the little boy's eyes as he tried to get up answered all of his questions.

"Son of a bitch," Dean Winchester muttered under his breath as he dusted glass off of himself, sunlight peeking out over the house and half-blinding him. He sprang to his feet, not wanting to give the demon a wide open shot at him. He'd known that the string of killings had been a demon's work, but he'd thought the father, not the son, was the one who had been possessed. Besides, demons usually possessed someone more... he didn't know. Large in size? The only demon he ever really heard of that possessed children had been Lilith, and she was long gone. He hoped.

Dean searched his pockets, looking for Ruby's demon killing knife. It was a few moments before he realized that he'd left it with Sam. Muttering another curse under his breath, he dodged out of the way of the desk that the demon sent flying his way. "Go without me, he says. Leave the knife, he says. You'll be fine, he says. Well screw you, Sam!" Dean growled out, turning around and sprinting towards the Impala, where he'd left all of his holy water. The demon, of course, wouldn't allow that. It jumped down from the lone willow tree in the front yard it had somehow come to occupy and landed right onto Dean's back. He landed face-first into some wilting flowers and literally ate dirt.

Luckily, the boy who was being possessed couldn't have been more than eighty pounds at most and Dean threw him off of his back in no time. He scrambled quickly to his feet, checking over his shoulder to see where the demon had landed. He couldn't see it, but he continued sprinting towards his car, snatching the keys out of his pocket as he went. He got to the trunk, his hands steady as he unlocked the back and flung it open.

The demon jumped on his back just as he was reaching for a jug of holy water. Its skinny little arms wrapped tightly around his neck and it began to get hard to breathe. He stumbled back and away from the Impala, the little boy's weight just enough to keep him away from his salvation. Suddenly, Dean realized that he might die, right then and there. He clawed at the demon boy's arms, but it held on with its supernatural strength. "Dean Winchester," it whispered in his ear, "Hell awaits you." Dean gasped, trying to take in air. The demon's grip got tighter, and Dean thought, _This is how I'm going to die. At the hands of some minor demon in the middle of Kansas. After all I've done and all I've seen. I'm going to die in frigging _Kansas.

With one of his last breaths, Dean choked out, "Cas!" He didn't know why he called out the angel's name. It just came out of his mouth, unbidden, like a prayer. One he hoped Castiel heard. He started seeing black spots swimming in his vision, and he made a last-ditch attempt to rid himself of the leech on his back by running backwards at full-speed and slamming into the tree repeatedly. It hung on, though, and eventually Dean started to lose consciousness. He was awake long enough to hear the distant flap of wings...

Waking up was very disorienting. When he'd been fighting the demon, it'd been early afternoon. He opened his eyes to see the half moon shining down upon him. He sat up as soon as he recollected what happened, feeling his neck for bruises.

Dean took a deep breath and closed his eyes, just glad to be alive for once, wanting to enjoy some sort of peace before another terrible thing happened. The grass he was sitting on was soft and there was a slight breeze stirring everything around him. The house of the boy who had been possessed was located in the middle of nowhere, miles away from any sort of main road. There were no cars driving by, and it was peaceful.

Suddenly, a voice spoke up, shattering his moment of silence in which he was just appreciating everything around. "Dean? Are you well?" Castiel's voice made him jump and his eyes shoot open. He turned around, looking up at the angel in surprise.

"Cas?" Dean asked in disbelief.

"I heard you call my name and came right away. It's lucky I got to you in time. That demon almost... what's that word you and Sam use? Ganked you?"

Dean cleared his throat. "Ah, yeah, thanks for that. I cut it pretty close there, didn't I? Didn't think you'd come, to be honest. Haven't seen you around in a while." There was uncertainty in his eyes as he looked up at Castiel. And, in truth, neither of the Winchester boys had seen the angel for two months. Another breeze swept across the lawn, lifting Castiel's trench coat about him, much like the first time they'd met. To many, he would look intimidating, but to Dean he was a familiar, comforting sight. He found himself smiling at the stoic, never changing look on Castiel's face.

After a long stretch of silence, Cas asked, "Will you be getting up any time soon?" What would have been a jab at Dean had he been with anyone but the angel, was a simple question accompanied with the same tone of voice Castiel always used. It was refreshing, to have someone who wasn't always looking for a way to one up him.

"Nah," Dean said after a moment, his lips curving into his signature half-smile. "It's a beautiful night out. View's better from down here." He patted the ground next to him with his hand, an open invitation for Cas to sit down. He then lay back, arms behind his head and his whole body completely relaxed.

Castiel didn't immediately sit down, but eventually Dean heard the rustle of his trench coat as the angel lay down next to him.

They studied the stars together, watching as they slowly blinked into existence. "I have not observed the stars like this before," admitted Castiel sometime later. "Though I have been taught many times about their brilliance, and how my father made them. But I had never though to view them like this..." He trailed off, something akin to wonder in his voice.

"Well, sometimes, ya just gotta stop and smell the roses," Dean replied, glancing over at Castiel, whose piercing blue eyes were searching the stars with an intensity he hadn't really seen in him before.

He watched as the angel's eyebrows scrunched together in confusion. "What roses are you talking of? I had thought we were talking of stars." Dean chuckled. He sometimes forgot that Cas was an angel, and wasn't accustomed to many of the sayings that humans knew so well.

"It's an expression, is all," he explained, turning his gaze back up to the stars. He wouldn't be the first to admit it, but they were actually beautiful. "It just means that you need to take the time to appreciate the things that you wouldn't normally. It's supposed to be good for the soul or something like that." He snorted at the ridiculousness of his own explanation.

There was a silence as both men drank in the peace of the moment. Dean couldn't remember the last time he'd spent such a relaxing moment with Castiel. Usually they were fighting demons, not star gazing.

"I feel like I should say something now," interrupted Castiel, turning towards Dean.

"I figured that you angels were used to the silence. You don't seem much like the talkative types, if you know what I mean." He sighed, suddenly wary. He forced himself to keep his gaze on the sky. "Cas, why'd you come?"

Castiel sounded confused when he replied, "Because you called me. I thought that would be obvious." Dean could feel as his gaze turned towards him once again. He stubbornly kept his eyes fixed on the stars above him.

"I _meant_," Dean replied, closing his eyes for a second and taking a moment in order to gather his thoughts, "that you always come when I call. You rebelled against Heaven for me. You put up with my snarky attitude and stupid jokes, and I never actually did much for you. I just don't get it. Not that I'm not grateful or anything. I just... don't understand." It had been bothering Dean for a while. He hadn't gotten a straight answer from Cas about it and it seemed as good a time to ask him as any.

Castiel took his time in answering. He chose his words carefully, as if he was piecing together a puzzle and only specific words fit together to make the correct sentence. "For quite a few years, before you were any more than an insignificant human to me, some of the orders that were coming from higher up had seemed... a little morally off. But I was a good soldier. I didn't question anything, and I did as I was told. That is, until I pulled you out of Hell – that's when it all started. I had never met someone who was so seemingly of no consequence believe they were so important. But you are important. And through you I managed to put my own moral compass back track. And for that, I owe you so much."

That was far from what Dean had expected – what he expected being Castiel admitting that he really had no inkling as to why he ever helped him in the first place. (But then again, Dean always figured other people thought the worst of him.) A smirk crept its way onto Dean's face, and Castiel smiled in response when Dean rolled his head to the side to look at the angel in the eyes.

"Well, Cas, if it makes you feel any better, the feelings mutual."

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**A/N: So, it's a little rough around the edges, but I'm kind of proud of it. Writing hasn't been coming too easily to me, so this one was a bit of a struggle, and I apologize for any awkward sentences or grammar mistakes. I think I did a decent job, though. Leave a review and tell me what you thought! **


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